I know we all joke about passing around the same mutual aid $20 bill, but in a polycrisis world, it feels like there's also a parcel of moral support and caring that we pass around between people in different kinds of crisis and hardship, too.

[mostlytato@mstdn.social]

@ShaulaEvans
I hope so. I think for most of us experience is a requisite for learning, and bad experience teaches harshly and can send people either way.
I think suffering can have a value for those capable of learning - but only up to a point, beyond which it is without value. And for those incapable of learning, no experience will change them in any meaningful way.
I think the answer is probably as complex as human psychology is.

[vlrny@disabled.social]

@ShaulaEvans @MostlyTato
It's only a part answer, but I think the people who have the ability to be kind to the vulnerable also know how to be kind to their own vulnerability.
So if there is some way to teach that self empathy (other than life kicking the outta ya) it would then easier to be present and to come alongside someone suffering.

[shaulaevans@zirk.us]

@vlrny @MostlyTato

> ...I think the people who have the ability to be kind to the vulnerable also know how to be kind to their own vulnerability.

Wow, Valery. 🤯

That's a really powerful insight.

(I would like to be more kind to my own various vulnerabilities -- it's a work in progress -- but at least I'm acutely aware thanks to experience that neither mine nor anyone else's are a result of moral failings, and that's a start.)

[mostlytato@mstdn.social]

@vlrny @ShaulaEvans
I think many find it easier to be kind to others than to themselves. Self kindness can be really hard due to the existence of guilt. But its wisdom surely not just to forgive others but to forgive oneself. And compassion to others is really compassion to oneself, you just have to come round to it by leaving the guilt to one side, gradually.
For me, forgiveness is a feeling rather than a statement of intent. Its easy to say something, its harder to genuinely feel it.

[vlrny@disabled.social]

@ShaulaEvans @MostlyTato ooo good point.

Bad things happen to good people.

I think there's a huge amount of denial around that. And if they don't victim blame then they'd have to consider they are vulnerable to bad things happening too.

As an aside I am profoundly grateful for the people who do have the skills and the heart to still be there within the hard stuff. This community sustains me.

[vlrny@disabled.social]

@MostlyTato @ShaulaEvans
I really struggle with forgiveness. Even with my intellectual capacity to empathize with those who suck at empathy.

[mostlytato@mstdn.social]

@vlrny @ShaulaEvans
If I'm honest, me too. I never tell anyone I forgive them unless I genuinely feel it.

[vlrny@disabled.social]

@MostlyTato @ShaulaEvans yeah, I need the forgiveness within my own heart. To stop carrying around that anger and that pain. The relationships themselves are long gone at this point.

[jennifer@partychickens.net]

@ShaulaEvans

I am obviously biased, but I think my sons turned out to be very empathetic people and I believe part of that is their early and continual exposure literature that had female main characters along with lots of real life experience with other cultures ( India, Latino, and POC) and lifestyles (LGBTQ+).

Representation matters.

[mostlytato@mstdn.social]

@vlrny @ShaulaEvans
It is hard to lose anger and pain. Its not a choice, it has to come to you in time. I carry trauma and I mask constantly to deal with it. I carry anger and I use it as fuel because its better than the alternative. Which doesn't make it good. But you will play any hand when its all you are dealt.
I hope your experience leads you to be able at some point to drop your anger and your pain.
Edit: mine too

[shaulaevans@zirk.us]

@jennifer Thank you for raising empathetic sons.

Signed,

A woman in this world

[vlrny@disabled.social]

@MostlyTato @ShaulaEvans thank you for saying all this. 🥲

It's helpful to think of it as something that unfolds not something I push to do (and fail to do).

Hrm.. and also anger as protective energy, maybe can't let go of the anger until I feel more safe.

[mostlytato@mstdn.social]

@vlrny @ShaulaEvans

For me, anger motivates whereas depression stops you dead in your tracks. Neither is good, but its better to act than to give up. But that's just me. Anger has its consequences. It needs to be left behind in due course and replaced with something better.

I've found that for me its counter productive to to actively try to do something that I find inherently passive. Such things come with time and understanding, not effort or intent.

[vlrny@disabled.social]

@MostlyTato @ShaulaEvans
"its better to act than to give up"
Amen to that!

[mostlytato@mstdn.social]

@vlrny @ShaulaEvans
Start where you are. Use what you have. Do what you can.
~Arthur Ashe

Finest words I ever heard, words one can try and live by in every breath. If you have anger, joy, guilt, hope, fear...use it.